


Almost Like Being In Love

by AnnetheCatDetective



Series: Give Me The News [11]
Category: St. Elsewhere
Genre: Domestic Fluff, Implied/Referenced Sexual Assault, M/M, Pre-Relationship, Victor Ehrlich: Disaster Bi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-31
Updated: 2018-12-31
Packaged: 2019-09-30 23:23:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,838
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17233097
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnnetheCatDetective/pseuds/AnnetheCatDetective
Summary: They're not dates... but the dinners are something.





	Almost Like Being In Love

    Victor is heading for on call and the promise of just a little time to sleep, when Peter White’s voice stops him. He doesn’t like that the guy is still in the building at all, and he definitely doesn’t want to look at him or speak to him _said you would be just like him if you were man enough talked about your_ wife _talked about her like he would talked about her like she It doesn’t matter you’re not together anymore he still shouldn’t have talked about her like that he shouldn’t have said ‘your wife’ like there was something like she would want like you couldn’t like it would be okay for him to_ after the last time they really crossed paths.

 

    Well. It’s not just White’s voice that stops him. It’s hearing it wrapped around his own name, and it makes him feel sick even not knowing what White was saying about him.

 

    “Peter, come on now.” Jack says, and at that, Victor’s heart is in his throat and his stomach feels like it’s in the basement somewhere without him. Whatever White’s saying about him, why is he saying it to Jack?

 

    _Probably wondering why he bothers with you could ask the same about him probably saying there’s something wrong with you everyone knows there’s something wrong with you but at least you’re nothing like him but what if he’s saying you are_?

 

    “I’m just saying, Jack, maybe you want to watch who you get close to.”

 

    “And I’m just saying you of all people might want to think about what it’s like, having people spread talk about you around. Don’t take your bad time out on Victor.”

 

    “Victor. Yeah, I spend a couple days away from this place and suddenly you’re cozy with Victor.”

 

    “Peter, this is ridiculous, I’m not replacing you. And there’s nothing sudden about it, we’re friends. _And_ my friendship with Victor has nothing to do with my friendship with you.”

 

    “Yeah, sure. Just think about what I’m telling you, you know, I’m saying this for your own good.”

 

    “I’m thinking about it, believe me. But I’m friends with who I’m friends with-- you know some people say that shouldn’t be you. And I’m here, aren’t I?”

 

    “Yeah, but I--”

 

    The door swings open, and White cuts himself off as he comes face to face with a red-faced, nauseated Victor, his expression shifting into a nasty smirk at the sight of him.

 

    “Hey hey, Trader Vic’s back. What happened to the professional look?” He nods to Victor’s shirt, shoulders past him, and Victor teeters there in the hallway, can’t breathe.

 

    “Hey.” Jack’s voice is soft, and Victor’s in no place to read into it, but Jack grabs his elbow and steers him into on call, and sits him down in the chair, puts little Pete in his lap, and Victor’s arms come up around him automatically. “Hey, you look rough, you okay?”

 

    “What did he say about me?” Victor asks, though his voice barely comes out, sounds hollow in his own ears. At least if he’s holding the baby, he can’t faint or throw up, those had both seemed like options when he’d been standing out in the hallway, and he still feels that same melange of humiliation and confusion, but he’s holding the baby, he can’t, he can’t be sick or drop him or do anything that might make him cry.

 

    “Victor… it’s not important.” Jack shakes his head. _Can’t look at you, whatever it was he can’t even look at you now_.

 

    “No, I-- I know people say things about me, it’s okay. I want to know. It wasn’t just about how professional I don’t look.”

 

    _Maybe Roberta was right, maybe you should keep fixing your hair, keep dressing normal, no, no, can’t live like that even if people think you’re weird you can’t, you could try and look professional even with the shirts, though, could do that, would people like you more would Jack?_

 

    “Really, it’s not important. He’s not going to say anything to anybody else.”

 

    “But he said something to you.”

 

    “Yeah. And if it’s not true, then it doesn’t matter. And if it is true, I won’t like you any less. It doesn’t matter, Victor. You and I are friends.” And Jack does look at him, at that, so he believes him. Touches his shoulder even, and Victor leans into it a little until it’s gone, but the sick feeling remains.

 

    “I don’t understand how you can stay friends with him, after what he did.” Victor says, cuddling the baby in his lap. Pete reaches up to grab at his glasses, and he has to carefully extract himself from a surprisingly strong grip before he can lean back out of grabbing range, giving him a couple of fingers to hold onto instead.

 

    “If he did. He says he’s innocent--”

 

    “Of course he _says_ he’s innocent, Jack--”

 

    “He at least deserves a fair trial before we all pass judgment.”

 

    “Jack, Wayne was _there_ , he was on top of Wendy, he’s the-- he’s…”

 

    “I think at ten months, you can say the word in front of him, he’s not going to know what it means.” Jack says wryly, at Victor’s hesitation.

 

    “He’s the ski mask.” Victor dodges the issue neatly just the same, doesn’t _want_ to say it.

 

    “If he was the ski mask, why wasn’t he wearing it with Wendy?”

 

    “I don’t know. But so what if there’s two-- two guys who-- running around attacking women, it-- he still attacked _her_ \-- I just don’t understand how you can keep defending him--”

 

    “Because.” Jack’s voice is tight, the way he holds his mouth is tight, even his posture is tight, where he normally holds himself in an easy, approachable slouch. _Because he still likes Peter White more than he’ll ever like you, so suck it up if you want what you can get_. “Because he had a key to my apartment. Where my _wife_ lived, Victor, you understand? Where she was alone all the time. And I couldn’t protect her, okay? I didn’t save her. But I can’t be the guy who put her in danger. I can’t-- I can’t… live with myself if that’s true, if I put her in danger like that.”

 

    Jack sits heavily on the lower bunk. Pete fusses, and Victor bounces him gently on his knee, kisses the top of his head and whispers nothing syllables to him until he quiets again. He still smells all baby-ish. It’s nice-- calming, if nothing else today is, and Victor just lets him chew on the fingers he’d been grabbing, he’s going to wash that hand before long anyway. And he thinks he does understand, because things are over with Roberta and he thinks maybe he hasn’t been in love with her for longer than he wanted to admit, but you can still love someone and not be in love with them, you can care about someone’s well-being and happiness and not be able to stand living with them, and he knows if he had ever put her in danger he’d hate himself for it. How much worse to feel that kind of doubt and worry over the love of your life? But Jack shouldn’t carry that around, even if Peter was always a little nasty some of the time, always too ready to be sure of himself, to not pay enough attention, to not think so much about others… still, if he’d been his best self with Jack... How could he guess what would happen?

 

    “Jack… but that was before all of this, he wasn’t a-- wasn’t-- he wasn’t an _r-a-p-i-s-t_ back then.” He still whispers the letters when he spells it out, though Pete just babbles around the hand in his mouth and ignores the grownup talk. He feels vaguely uncomfortable anyway.

 

    “If he could do something like this when he’s got his life back on track, when he’s completed rehab, just got Myra and the kids back, then how can I tell myself he wouldn’t have done it when things were falling apart?”

 

    “You’d have known if he ever made Nina uncomfortable…”

 

    “Would I? There’s this whole world of… worry, that I never knew anything about. What if she didn’t want to say anything because Peter and Myra were our friends? How many times did she not say something because she just thought I couldn’t understand? About this, about anything?”

 

    “I don’t know. I’m probably the worst guy to ask.”

 

    “I dunno. You gave it a shot. At least you know what it’s like to share your life with someone for a little while.”

 

    “And everyone here knows how lousy I am at it.”

 

    “When it’s the right someone, you won’t be. Come on. No more pity party-- for either of us. We need to get some sleep now while we have the chance.” Jack scoops Pete from Victor’s lap, giving him a kiss and a cuddle before depositing him in his pen and getting a little plush camel into his hands, and Victor wipes his hand and rises after, moving to stand next to the bunks, hesitating until Jack turns back to him. “Top or bottom?”

 

    “Top. Usually. If you don’t mind?”

 

    “No, suits me just fine.” Jack slides back into the lower bunk, looking up at Victor with an unreadable smile. Something in it still ties Victor’s stomach in knots, even if he doesn’t know what it means, even if he can’t account for the warmth of his voice. They’d just been arguing, he doesn’t understand how he’s being smiled at at all. And Jack just props himself up a moment on one elbow, stretches his legs out.“I just care about the fact that you don’t snore.”

 

    “I don’t think I do. If I did I think everybody would have heard about that, too.”

 

    “Well, then we’ll do great.” Jack says, and he looks so…

 

    _Inviting_.

 

    As if Victor could slide in next to him, except there’s no room for the both of them _you can come down and spoon with me, that’s what he’d said once, and you know he didn’t mean it you always knew he didn’t mean it but look at him his smile his legs his shoulder just right to fit your head to_ , he could never actually.

 

    “Sure. Great.” He nods, climbing up into the top bunk and trying to fit himself comfortably. Nothing’s _long_ enough but at least he feels like there’s more breathing room up top sometimes.

 

    “Do we get off together tonight?” Jack asks.

 

    Victor’s brain shorts out. He knows what he means, of course he knows what Jack means, he’d have to be a real dummy not to know what Jack _means_ , but the thoughts that wording puts in his head…

 

    “I don’t think so… get off at nine.”

 

    “Mm. Another night, then, I guess. I owe you that dinner.”

 

    “Another night. ‘Night, Jack.” Victor turns out the light. It feels a little silly to say ‘goodnight’ at two in the afternoon, but it might as well be night for how long they’ve been up, and even Pete’s down for a nap and he doesn’t know what else _to_ say.

 

    “G’night, Victor.” Jack chuckles softly.

 

    Victor must spend half his break lying awake, listening to the sound of Jack’s slow breathing, Pete going from playing with his toy to falling asleep himself. Thinking about how it would feel to be held, not by some faceless, imaginary man, but by _Jack_. Jack’s lean frame against his back, Jack’s arms strong around him, Jack’s gentle hands resting over his heart, carding through his hair.

 

    He might as well dream of being cuddled by Brian Wilson for all it’s not going to happen, but…

 

    But Jack is there in the bunk below his and Victor sees his smile when he closes his eyes, and it takes him forever to get a little sleep.

 

\---/-/---

 

    Victor doesn’t swing another late afternoon free, but he trades shifts around to get a reasonable hour off. Reasonable enough to join Jack for dinner, though he’s late enough that Pete’s already been put down for the night in his playpen. Victor drifts over to look in on him, when Jack lets him in.

 

    “Is he a good sleeper?” He asks, fighting the impulse to reach down and touch. He’s so cute, curled up and dreaming, drooling on one loose fist. It had felt so comfortable to hold him… Sure, he’d come over for Jack, but he’s a little sorry he missed his window to play with Pete, they kind of developed a little rapport. As much as you can develop a rapport with a baby, anyway, he guesses.

 

    “He’ll wake up in a couple hours and I’ll change him, walk him around a little, but then he’ll go back down.” Jack nods, standing at Victor’s side, gazing down with the softest smile on his face. “Sometimes a couple times a night, but he sleeps through more than he used to. He won’t sleep through the night for a good while, probably, but that’s okay. Daddy’s used to getting up. Daddy’s used to not getting much sleep.” He snorts.

 

    “You move him to the bedroom when he wakes up?”

 

    “Sometimes, yeah, if he’s having a bad night he just comes and sleeps with me. I mean-- Pete’s got a nursery, but… He outgrew his old bassinet and… He’s getting a crib, he’s getting a crib, it’s just… He sleeps there, you know, and he’s fine. For now.”

 

    “Hard to want to use your time off to assemble furniture, huh?”

 

    “I just don’t trust myself to, honestly. What if I mess it up, what if he gets hurt? You know? I mean… I’m trying not to be too much of a worrier, but…” Jack shrugs, bending down to gently touch Pete’s cheek. “It’s hard.”

 

    “Sure. Of course it is.” Victor shifts, his arm resting against Jack’s a moment. “You want to protect him, that’s… about as natural as it gets.”

 

    “You want to sit down with a drink while I finish throwing dinner together? I’ll get you a coke. Or… uh, it might be something else, but it’s something.”

 

    “Sure, something’s my favorite.” Victor grins, feels his heart give a little leap when Jack laughs. “I’m easy, really.”

 

    “Well. Good to know.” Jack smiles. It’s one of those ones that starts out slow and blossoms across his face, and lifts that sad look he’s had so much the past year. One of those ones that make Victor feel like he’s missing something, though not in a bad way exactly. “Then I guess I can keep you happy.”

 

    “I guess you can,yeah. I mean-- I just guess it’s not-- You know. _Sure_.”

 

    Victor sits on the sofa, craning his neck to watch Jack disappear into the kitchen. He reemerges with a can of diet cola in hand, their fingers brush as he passes it off, so warm against the cold of it, and maybe it was bound to happen, they both have pretty good-sized hands, but still. Victor can’t make himself forget the warmth of even that fleeting, accidental touch.

 

    “Are you sure I can’t help you with anything in the kitchen?”

 

    “No, it’ll just be a minute now. My turn to cook.” Jack smiles, and maybe it doesn’t mean anything, but Victor’s chest locks up like it does and his stomach squirms and his face feels hot, and there’s nothing he can do about that.

 

    “Next time, then.” He says, before he can stop himself.

 

    “Yeah.” Jack’s smile gets to be _more_ somehow, in a way he can’t measure. “I’d like that. I’m gonna run out of things I can make real fast…”

 

    “That’s okay, I like cooking anyway. I mean-- I’d be happy doing it more often, if… if we keep doing this.”

 

    “Sure. Well, I’ll at least handle providing the food you’re cooking when it’s my turn.” He nods. “I like doing this.”

 

    Victor breaks out into a grin, as Jack returns to the kitchen. He likes doing this! They’re going to keep doing this!

 

    Jack calls him in, and it really is just a couple minutes since he’d been told it was almost ready. Steak sandwiches, drenched in red sauce, and it honestly does smell incredible, even if the sauce necessitates the use of a fork and knife, which really undoes the whole point of a sandwich in the first place. Victor can’t say he minds.

 

    “Dinner looks great, thanks.”

 

    “Thanks-- you’re welcome.” Jack glances down. “I couldn’t find an avocado that wasn’t hard as a rock, but aside from that I think it came out pretty good. I make two things that aren’t macaroni and hamburger helper, it’s this or fajitas, and honestly the insides are all pretty much the same, so…”

 

    “Oh, I don’t mind. I mean… I like fajitas, I’d eat fajitas any day of the week.” He says, maybe a touch overeager, maybe. “If you want to take turns cooking and just make the same couple things, it wouldn’t bother me, I mean, variety is overrated.”

 

    “You don’t think it’s the spice of life?”

 

    “I think spice is the spice of life, and variety is… the variety of life, I don’t know. I mean, things are what they are. I’m not an un-adventurous person but I like… I like routine, I like things to be familiar and comfortable, too. You know, I get my kicks on a surfboard, I feel alive in the OR, but the rest of my life should be safe and predictable. I mean, you know?”

 

    “Sure. It can’t be all thrill-a-minute, life-or-death. Where do you even surf out here? Seems like such a Californian thing. California or Hawaii, not… Massachusetts.”

 

    “Gloucester, but the water’s _frigid_ , and you gotta be careful because the conditions can be pretty dangerous, I mean you can really get raked over out there when it’s choppy, and when the tide comes in there’s-- Well. And when it’s not rough, it’s a little _too_ glassy, it’s definitely not California. But there’s not a lot of localism, either, it’s the best spot I’ve found that I can really get to. Provided I can get a day off to do it. I used to hit Fort Point, in San Francisco? Every chance I got! And Malibu, whenever I could make that trip over a weekend, but I could book it over to Fort Point from Berkeley, just about twenty miles… And I used to think the water _there_ was cold, you know, compared to Malibu. Boy, here, it’s…” He gives a theatrical shiver, before taking his first bite. He moans around the fork-- maybe also a little theatrical, but genuine, everything about his reaction to the food is genuine. He’s just… theatrically genuine, when he enjoys things.

 

    He doesn’t think there’s anything wrong with that.

 

    He’s been called theatrical in his responses to a lot of things, whether or not he enjoys them, really. He doesn’t know why it’s such a bad thing if he expresses what he’s feeling. Why people act like it’s so funny. Like there’s something wrong with a guy who shows what he thinks about things too much.

 

    Jack is maybe waiting for verbal confirmation, Victor guesses, he seems to be waiting, chewing on his lower lip a little, and well it’s not like Victor doesn’t understand a little performance anxiety when someone’s trying your cooking for the first time.

 

    “This is-- this is really good.” He says. The last thing he wants Jack to be is anxious.

 

    “Thanks, I’m glad you like it. I guess the water’s pretty cold up in Seattle… but I guess I wouldn’t know much about it.”

 

    “Forty-nine degrees and up, usually, but not up as high as sixty-- I mean, I’ve never been, but I’ve heard from some guys who’ve surfed up there. But it’s thirty-nine to maybe fifty at best in Gloucester, times I’ve been.”

 

    “Sounds very cold.”

 

    “Mm-- yeah. Well, even San Francisco is about sixty. And I mean, I wear a full-suit-- a full-length wetsuit?-- so a little cold doesn’t put me off! But I tell you, that five degrees’ difference between a warm day in San Francisco and even an average one in Malibu, after a while you can feel it. And out _here_? I just can’t spend as much time in the Atlantic as I’d _enjoy_.”

 

    “You in a wetsuit, that I have to see.” Jack chuckles. Somehow it doesn’t sound at _all_ like making fun.

 

    “Come out to the beach with me and you’ll see it.” Victor replies, without thinking. Not until the words are out and Jack is just looking at him, like… He doesn’t know what like. “I mean-- if we ever-- if we had the same day off sometime, you-- It’s a pretty nice beach they have up in Gloucester and you could take Pete. Build sand castles and… all that stuff you do with a little kid.”

 

    “He’s just coming up on one year, I don’t think he’s ready for a whole lot in the way of sand castles.”

 

    “Oh.” Victor’s face falls.

 

    “That doesn’t mean he wouldn’t like the beach.” Jack reaches halfway across the table, his hand hovering in the space between them a moment. “Sometime we’ll go.”

 

    “It’s just about an hour on the train.”

 

    “Probably just drive. We could pick you up. I mean… if we were getting the same day off, going to the same place, might as well, right? Cut down on some travel time.”

 

    “Oh.” It’s like a balloon is being blown up inside his chest except the balloon is his heart and it’s not displacing anything, but he feels like he’s expanding somehow, and Jack is just… is just _smiling_ at him. “Great. Well I can navigate, then.”

   

    “Great.”

 

    They both focus on the food for a while, until Jack lifts his head again, a pause stretching out a moment.

 

    “So what do you wear in Malibu?”

 

    “What?”

 

    “Where the water’s warmer.”

 

    “Oh. Well-- usually the full-suit still. If I’m gonna be out there, you know. I mean after a couple hours, it doesn’t matter how warm the water is, you’re still gonna be just… leaching body heat. It’s different if it’s a hot day and the waves are mush and you’re just splashing around, I mean, I’ve got a bathing suit. Doesn’t see a _whole_ lot of action unless I hit a swimming pool, but sometimes. I like to be out there even if the surf’s no good, just to be there. Um, why, why did you ask?”

 

    “Dunno. Just wondered, I guess. Probably doesn’t matter if I’m not doing more than getting my toes wet. What _I_ wear, I mean.”

 

    “No, guess not.” Victor nods, taking another bite. _I mean feel free to wear as little as you like, Jack, that would be just fine and dandy, if you don’t want to wear a shirt, hell, I mean, if you want to wear a speedo, that’d be peachy keen, but Victor you can’t_ say _that to a guy, it doesn’t matter how much of him you’re interested in seeing and it doesn’t matter how nice he is no one is that nice, no one is just going to let you drool over him because you might see him with his shirt off, might see a little leg_.

 

    “I’ll just keep you posted about my schedule, I guess.”

 

    “Yeah, I don’t know when I’ll get a whole day off, I tell you, but… when I do, that’s where I’m going. It-- it’d be more fun, going with you guys. Now, I know it’s a little early to get Petey on a surfboard, but…”

 

    “No.” Jack laughs. “You’re not teaching my kid to surf, he’s ten months old.”

 

    “Right, I’d wait for the one year mark. Fourteen months, when it’s warmer out.”

 

    “Absolutely not, it’s not safe.”

 

    “Nothing bad is going to happen to him on Uncle Victor’s watch, honest! I’m very experienced. I mean, I could teach _you_ \--”

 

    “If you’re teaching me, who’s holding the baby?”

 

    “Well, I’ve thought of that, believe it or not, and what we’d do is, you know, first time out, I just show you how to balance on the board, dry land. We can juggle Pete while you get a feel for it, no problem. Then we just have to get a third adult to come out with us next time. Okay, that part might be tricky.”

 

    “Might be, yeah. I don’t know, Victor, I mean… it’s not that I wouldn’t love to benefit from your _experience_ …” Jack’s foot taps his under the table as he slouches down a little more in his seat. An accident, sure, but… Victor’s heart leaps a little just the same.

 

    “But someone’s got to hold the kid, got it.”

 

    “And it’s risky, I mean… I gotta think about that. It doesn’t make me the most fun guy, but… I’ve got a baby, and right now I’m all he’s got. So if I hit my head and drown, or get mistaken for a seal by a hungry shark… you know?”

 

    “Oh. Well I don’t think you will! But… I mean, I understand. No pressure!” He holds his hands up. “I don’t think that means you’re not fun. You can be responsible and still be fun. But I mean… When Pete’s a little older, if he’s ever interested… all I’m saying is, watch me out there and see how I do, and just think about the fact that it’s safer than football.”

 

    “You’re kidding me.”

 

    “No, really! Think about it-- unless you’re out there in dangerous conditions, it’s actually really safe so long as you’re not alone, and the kinds of injuries you get, it’s nothing compared to someone who gets sacked by three hundred pounds of muscle as part of their sport. Sharks aren’t as big a problem as people think, you just don’t surf where the sharks are going to be if you can help it, but if you’re avoiding choppy waters and if you never go out without a buddy in case things do go wrong, it’s great cardiovascular exercise, and it’s got way less risk of concussion than just about any sport out there.”

 

    “I’ll watch you and let you know what I think. Either way, not until he’s got some basic coordination. Right now we’re working on standing up without holding onto something.”

   

    “Sure. Just… just saying, someday. If he wanted to learn, I’d make sure he was safe.”

 

    “Yeah. You would.” Jack nods. “I know. When he’s big enough, you can show us both the ropes then. Think you’ll still be hitting the waves in about a decade?”

 

    “I’ll be hitting the waves until they bury me.” Victor raises his drink emphatically, is surprised when Jack mirrors the gesture. He hadn’t meant it as anything more than physical punctuation, on his way towards taking a drink.

 

    “I’ll drink to that. To lifelong passions.”

 

    Victor thinks he could probably have lived without hearing Jack say ‘passions’, even casually.

 

    “What are, uh, what are your lifelong, um, passions?”

 

    “I’m not sure.” He admits, with a soft laugh. “When’s it too late to figure that out?”

 

    “Oh, never, I guess. I mean, you can start any time, as long as you keep, uh, keep passionate about it for the rest of your life.”

 

    “I never had one of those hobbies that was _it_ for me. Played a couple sports when I was a kid, liked all of it okay. Like a lot of things okay. I don’t think I’ve ever been passionate about anything that’s not-- just, real corny. Having a family. Helping people.” Jack shrugs.

 

    “I don’t think that’s corny. I mean… I think those are good things to be passionate about.”

 

    “Yeah? Well. I guess I’ve got a good start.”

 

    Things fade to a comfortable quiet again, for a little while, and again, Jack breaks it, before Victor can quite finish eating.

 

    “Stay for a cup of coffee?”

 

    “Boy, how could I refuse?” Victor grins, leaning in a little-- he has to catch his tie before it can fall into the plate of sauce in front of him. He’d say yes even if it wasn’t any better than hospital coffee, but it doesn’t hurt that it’s really good.

 

    “I don’t know if I can dig up dessert--”

   

    “Don’t bother, I’m stuffed. I mean-- I’m going to finish this, but after that…”

 

    “Just coffee, then.” Jack smiles.

 

    “I’m a willing hostage to the powers of a superior caffeine fix. At this point I don’t know if it even does anything to keep me awake, but if you asked me to go without it, I’d riot.”

 

    “Well, it just has to get you home, and then it’s probably just as well if it doesn’t keep you up.” Jack finishes off his last bite, taking his plate to the sink before moving to start a pot of coffee.

 

    Victor polishes off the last of his dinner, rising with his own plate. “Can I help with the dishes? I’ll wash, you dry? I mean, or the other way around, but I don’t really know where you keep everything, so-- Did I say something wrong?”

 

    “No.” He shakes his head, pasting a smile he probably means to be reassuring over the look Victor had caught. A look Victor still doesn’t know what to make of, except it seemed like he must have said something wrong. “No, you’re-- Yeah. I’d like that.”

 

    “Because if I said something wrong--”

 

    “You didn’t. I’m just… I’m used to doing all this by myself. Um… been a while since I’ve had someone to share dish duty with.”

 

    “Oh.”

 

    “It’s not a bad thing. That you’re offering. I mean, it’s-- it’s nice of you, Victor, I appreciate it. Really.”

 

    He feels awkward now, though at least he figures washing dishes can only make him feel better. But it’s so easy to picture them doing this together, now the idea’s in his head. Married out of college, they’d have a system, they’d be a well-oiled machine, they’d probably flirt over the sink and… he doesn’t know. Whatever married people do when they’re happy.

 

    He and Roberta never had that. He didn’t really like the person she turned into, though, and she stopped liking the person he always was. The whole thing was so short he doesn’t know why there’s so much paperwork to undo it. Anyway, she wasn’t really good at washing the dishes and so sue him, he has standards, would have rather done the job alone than have a fight over having to re-do them every time she did them, and…

 

    And he just bets the Morrisons were the opposite of what he and Roberta were like. And he thinks it’s probably sick, or at least a little tasteless, to be jealous of a dead woman. Because you love her husband, because you like taking care of her son. _Not like you’re going to replace her_.

 

    Well no, of course he can’t replace her, it’s not like he doesn’t wish she was still alive-- with how everything had gone, the heart hadn’t even done them any good in the long run, it’s not like he can tell himself it was for a purpose, or anything like that. But it’s not like there’s anything he can do about that, there was nothing he could do about that when Porter General sent her heart over and he didn’t know-- There’s never been anything he could do, except to try and be… try and be _helpful_ , he guesses, try and be good company. Try and be a friend.

 

    He thinks if he died and left a family behind, he’d want somebody to come along and be a friend, in his absence.

 

    _Yeah, but not the way you’re doing it._

 

    Well, what does he know, anyway?

 

    He goes over every dish meticulously as if they were his own, before handing them off to Jack or placing them in the rack to wait, and the aroma of the coffee has filled the kitchen by the time he’s done. Something… slightly nutty and almost sweet. Maybe, just maybe, better than the coffee he used to get back home. A little bit.

 

    “Cream? Sugar? Actually, the cream is just whole milk, but… it’s better than powdered creamer.”

 

    “How does powdered creamer manage to taste watery, that’s what I want to know. Um-- please, a little and a little, that’s great.”

 

    “A little and a little.” Jack smiles, pouring out two cups of coffee, in his handmade-looking mugs. Gives them each a spoonful of sugar and a splash of milk, and their hands touch again when he passes Victor’s over. “C’mon, we might as well be comfortable in the living room. If we’re not loud, we won’t wake Petey.”

 

    Victor just nods, following. They each tuck into one end of the sofa, turned in towards each other, legs stretched out at an angle so as to not quite meet.

 

    It would be easy to meet.

 

    Hoo boy, talk about trouble. Talk about your emotional danger zone. Talk about… talk about Jack Morrison looking relaxed and comfortable and happy, big hands wrapped around his cup of coffee, look on his face as he breathes in the steam, the sweetest guy Victor’s ever wanted, and why did he think he could do this?

 

    He barely waits until his coffee has reached a drinkable temperature. It’s as good as he remembered it being. Not that it has to be.

 

    “Chalk this up to me being a bitter, jaded divorcé who doesn’t get nearly enough sleep, Jack, but this coffee is better than sex.” He groans.

 

    “Well, we do that better in Seattle, too.” Jack smiles down into his coffee, and Victor wheezes out an uncomfortable laugh.

 

    Not that he means… No. No, it’s not Jack’s fault if Victor’s mind is in the gutter. Also his glasses are literally steamed up, but he can blame that on the coffee, not the conversation.

 

    Well.

 

    He barely knows what to picture. He _knows_ , he’s a doctor, he knows how it all works, he just doesn’t know how to _picture_ it, too much of his experience with the human body is clinical. All his experience with a male human body other than his own is clinical. A rectal exam isn’t exactly sexy. He knows how to imagine a blowjob, but he’s never been in the position-- not that position-- and anyway, the _last_ thing he should be doing is encouraging himself to picture it _now._ Not now, sitting on Jack’s couch _ask him to show you how much better_ just being friendly, just… things are nice, and he doesn’t want to ruin everything _he wouldn’t be so quick to forgive_ you _, not for this, would he?_ by making Jack feel uncomfortable in any way, by saying something weird and wrong and inexcusably piggish.

 

    “I’d offer to try and arrange you a bag, but then what would I bribe you over with?” Jack looks up from the depths of his coffee at last, meeting Victor’s eyes, his own bright. Victor’s glasses have un-steamed just enough to let him see the man, but it’s with a dreamy kind of soft focus, which is also the last thing he needs.

 

    “Fajitas. Although, my turn next. I was thinking blackened chicken, but if you’re more a beef stroganoff guy, I’m flexible, I’m flexible.”

 

    “Flexible, that’s good to know. You’ll be flexible, I’ll be easy. Make whatever you feel like. Fajitas is all I have left to offer…”

 

    “It’s a good offer, what’s to improve?”

 

    “I mean, and eggs, if you’re ever here for breakfast. That’s one more thing I can do.”

 

    _Down, boy, he does not mean it like that. Bad, bad. You need a cold shower or something, what is with you today?_

 

    “See, you’ve got, uh, lots to offer. Plus I could always come over and… I dunno. Do the windows.”

   

    “Victor, that’s a favor to me, not to you.”

 

    “Oh. Right. Well-- the windows look fine anyway, honestly, I just-- I’ll take any excuse, I guess, I like… I like coming over.” His voice falters. Is that too much or is that a normal sentiment to express to a friend? The kind of friend you have dinner with instead of just seeing at work, the kind of friend whose kid calls you ‘Uncle Victor’, or would if he could talk. The kind of friend whose ass you’ve noticed and whose hands are a work of art-- or whose hands you’ve noticed and whose ass is a work of art, there’s really very little distinction.

 

    “Good. I like having you over.” Jack smiles again, that warmest, sweetest smile, the kind that could make a guy’s heart do some things, or at least makes Victor’s, whenever he catches sight of it aimed his way. Jack’s foot taps against his once, and it’s…

 

    It’s not _fuck_ a sexual kind of thing or anything, it’s not _what if it was_ flirty, not a slow slide _not traveling up your calf but just imagine_ , it’s just a little tap, but it’s _deliberate_ , he means to do it, it isn’t just because they’ve got long legs under a small table. It’s… something. It makes Victor feels like he’s done something _right_. Like he hasn’t just said the wrong thing all night, like he hasn’t said the wrong thing at all, even once!

 

    “Well, I like-- Oh. I guess-- Well. So blackened chicken’s good?”

 

    “Blackened chicken’s great. Whenever you can come over. Um, Pete likes having you over, too. He’s crazy about you.”

 

    “Yeah? You think?”

 

    “Yeah, I can tell. He thinks you’re about as great as Doctor Craig. Not that I ever _said_ anything about the chief of surgery being a soft touch for infants.”

 

    “Oh, gee, I wish.” Victor laughs. “At least I’m in good company. And my lips are sealed, you said nothing.”

 

    Their feet touch again, though this time Victor’s pretty sure it’s an accident-- Jack’s attention has dropped back to his coffee. It’s an easy slip to make.

 

    He doesn’t pull back, though. If Jack hasn’t noticed yet, he can pretend he hasn’t noticed, either. Too deep in thought over something, and his teeth catch at his lower lip, and Victor _wants_ … but he can’t have.

 

    “The offer’s open, if you need to grab some sleep here. If that caffeine’s not working for you.”

 

    “I’d better not.” _You could, you could stay, stay for breakfast, stay until he kicks you out, except he would, eventually you’d make a mistake and you’d lose everything but Victor, just once, can’t you stay?_ “We’d have to rush in the morning and I wouldn’t have clothes, or a toothbrush, and I’d have to use your shower, and… I’d just be in your way.”

 

    “Okay. Well… next time, if you need to. You wouldn’t be in the way, Victor.”

 

    _Victor, you need to, you_ need _to._

 

    “Sure, maybe next time. I mean, I’d--” _Like to, more than anything_. He sucks in a breath, stops himself from saying so. Jack’s foot shifts from up against his own, but it doesn’t seem any more deliberate. “We’ll see, right?”

 

   “Right.”

 

   Victor finishes his coffee and gets to his feet, awkwardly cradling the empty mug against his chest. “I should…”

 

   “No, right.” Jack rises, holding out a hand. “I’ll drop these in the kitchen and see you out.”

 

   “Sure.” He nods, surrendering the mug, feeling too much at the brush of Jack’s hand.

 

   It is too much, he knows it is. He’s nearly thirty, he shouldn’t go all… twitterpated as a teenager over the tiniest thing. But it’s _different_. It’s Jack, and it’s not that there’s no one else who has a nice smile and wonderful hands and a great ass and curly hair and who’s kind and who could make him feel things, but…

 

  But it’s been just about half his life since he _allowed_ himself to feel anything like this for a guy, and it makes everything so much keener, there’s no immunity to it.

 

  Not that he has much immunity where women are concerned. He’s always been the type to fall hard, and at the slightest provocation. But this is still kind of something else…

 

  He trails helplessly after Jack, to wait at the kitchen doorway, before walking with him to the door to go.

 

  “I guess I’ll see you at work.”

 

  “Yeah. Hey…” Jack smiles, reaching out, Victor’s heart stops, Jack tugs gently at his shirt, just straightening it a little, not… not even because Victor thinks it needed to be straightened, certainly not now when he’s just going home. “It’s good to see you looking like yourself again.”

 

   “Oh.” He licks his lips, nerves going haywire. Haywire in a not entirely unpleasant way. “It is?”

 

   “Yeah. Missed seeing some color around the place. Besides… you smile more when you’re you.” Jack says, and Victor is absolutely at a loss for words, or anything else for that matter. He’s trying to remember how to breathe when Jack reaches up and touches his hair, just briefly, just gently, where it falls across his forehead, and his heart rockets into the stratosphere. “Missed this, too.”

 

   “You-- you did?” He asks at last. He might faint, he might actually. _Yeah that’ll impress him_.

 

   “The hair gel’s kind of… severe. You just look… friendlier, without it, I guess. I mean… I know what you’re like. If you like the look of it, I don’t mean there’s anything wrong with it. Just that I like seeing the old Victor again.”

 

  “Oh. Oh. Great. I mean-- thanks? I mean-- I mean, I just… it’s… It’s hard not being me. It was hard. I mean, and I get it, I’m a lot. I don’t look normal. But…”

 

   “But who’s counting?”

 

   “Nobody, anymore, I guess.”

 

   “That’s good. I mean… not that it’s good you-- I mean I’m sorry about Roberta, really I am, but… I’m not sorry you’re you.”

 

   “You’re not?”

 

   He shakes his head. “Why would I be?”

 

   “I don’t know. I just think most people are, I guess.”

 

   “I don’t think so. I think people like you. Maybe not everyone, but… nobody is universally liked.”

 

   “You are.”

 

   Jack’s smile fades a little. “I’m really not. I just-- I dunno. I think people like you, and I think people should like you. I like you.”

 

   “Oh. I like you.”

 

   “I’m glad.” He laughs, and tweaks the way Victor’s shirt sits again. “‘Cause a guy has to like me before I agree to spend a day at the beach with him. That’s a hard and fast rule. After the boards, and when the weather’s nice-- we’ll figure out a day?”

 

   “Yeah. Either we’ll be celebrating our success or we’ll have a lot of days off to bum around.”

 

   “Let’s try and think positive for now. You’re going to do great. You have a good night, Victor… I’ll see you tomorrow.”

 

   “Right. Tomorrow, yeah.” _Or you could change your mind. You could stay. He would let you stay._ “Hey, and you, too. Goodnight, Jack.”

 

   “Goodnight, Victor.”

 

   He spends a long moment standing on the other side of the door, lingering, racking his brain for something else he can say, until he hears a door open somewhere along the hall, and he breaks away with one last wave goodbye.

 

_You know what they’d think, seeing you mooning outside his door, they’d be right, they’d see it even if he can’t. Who are you fooling?_

 

   Everyone, if he’s lucky, and for as long as he can.

 

   Outside of that one moment of anxiety, though… outside of that, he feels good.

 

\---/-/---

 

    Victor feels good a couple days straight, great even, up until the news about the fumigation.

 

    Well, of course he’d rather be fumigated than not be fumigated, he very much does not want to learn the hard way that he should have been fumigated with the rest of the building, but his previous experience with bug bombs had necessitated being out of the house for a laughable six hours. Six hours and he would barely be into his shift, he could have done six hours easy.

 

    This isn’t any six hours.

 

    “I can’t believe I have to be out of my apartment all night. I’m going to have to sleep in on call!” He moans, forehead thudding against the table. “And when I was getting off early!”

 

    “It could be worse. One time I had to be out of the house for a week for a fumigation.” Wayne says, unhelpfully.

 

    “Yeah, I believe that of you.”

 

    “You could stay with me. I mean… there’s a kind of symmetry to it.”

 

    “No. I’ll get a motel room. It might be marginally less filthy. Wayne, you and I were not meant to cohabitate, not under any circumstances, last time taught us that. Especially not in a studio!”

 

    “What’s wrong?” Jack drops into a seat at their table-- startling Victor. He had expected Jack to eat with White. He normally does. Or was White off prepping for his trial? Jack’s got Pete in his lap, ignores his own lunch in favor of starting to get some applesauce into the little guy, but some of his focus is on Victor.

 

    “My building’s being fumigated… I’ve got to shell out for a motel for tonight, or sleep here at work.”

 

    “Or my place?”

 

    Victor swallows. _Or Jack’s place_. That is… tempting.

 

    “You mean it?”

 

    “Sure. We’ll have dinner, hang out, get some sleep… back at work. By the time you’re done there, your apartment should be safe, right?”

 

    “Right. I mean-- just one night, I won’t be in your way?”

 

    “You won’t be in my way at all. Just grab me when you get off, I’ll be around.”

 

    “Great! I’ll do that. Well-- I better-- rounds! But I’ll catch you then.” Victor stands, grabbing his tray.

 

    “Rounds? You just sat down!” Wayne calls after him.

 

\---/-/---

 

    Jack’s place… Jack’s place… He’s been at Jack’s place before, sure, but he’s going to sleep there. He’s not sure _how_ he’s going to sleep there, he feels like he’ll be wired until he eventually explodes from it, but…

 

    But he gets to make blackened chicken over rice, while talking to Jack-- and to Pete, as Jack walks him around the kitchen and keeps him just out of glasses-grabbing range.

 

    Dinner is comfortable, dinner is always comfortable. Well, sure, they avoid the topic of White’s trial… but he figures he gets why it’s a difficult thing for Jack to have to grapple with, even if he personally thinks he should be able to dump the guy.

 

    Without touching on that, though, it’s… it’s nice. It’s that dangerously domestic kind of nice, he feels too much like he belongs, he takes turns feeding Pete so that Jack doesn’t have to neglect his dinner, he tells a couple jokes that land-- well, with Jack, Pete’s not really there yet, but still, Victor keeps it clean anyway despite the reminder that a ten month old isn’t going to understand nearly enough for an off-color punchline to be a problem.

 

    “You can take the bed, if you want.” Jack says, as he rocks Pete to sleep in his arms after dinner. “I’ll put new sheets on it for you. So you don’t have to sleep out here with the kid.”

 

    “I don’t mind. I’m good with a couch, and if I get woken up in the middle of the night, it’s nothing new.” Victor shakes his head. _The bed, you could take the bed, you could say don’t bother with new sheets I’m sure it’s fine you could sleep in his bed_ but that would hurt too much. That would be too close, he’d _smell him on his pillowcase_ regret it if he said yes.

 

    “Are you sure? It’s no trouble--”

 

    “I’m sure. Hey… Jack, I’ve got a kind of a-- now this may be a weird question, but I mean, speaking of me sleeping out here…”

 

    “Shoot.”

 

    “Just if I have trouble dropping off! But would it be weird, if I reorganized your cassettes? Because you don’t seem to have a system that I can make heads or tails of, and I mean, obviously if mine doesn’t work for you, everything can change!”

 

    “Do what you want, I guess, if it helps you sleep, but… don’t get hung up on doing a perfect job. Half of those aren’t even in the right case.” Jack says, and Victor can tell, he can tell he’s reacted too much by the way Jack looks at him. “We… weren’t the most organized people. Well, I’m not the most organized person. I mean I’m not-- I don’t thrive on chaos or anything, but I’ve never had a knack for putting things right, and Nina, you know… she was good with a lot of things, but the music library was never a priority, she’d put the tapes back in whatever case was open.”

 

    “I’m just going to start on that right now.”

 

    Jack laughs, nodding. “Okay. Knock yourself out.”

 

    “That’s exactly what I’m doing. I’m giving myself the peace of mind I need to sleep.”

 

    He pulls all the cases, and sits cross-legged on the floor by the shelving unit for the tapes, and he starts going through and making sure the right tapes are in the right cases, sorting them into rough piles as he goes. Mostly rock and roll, though there are different flavors. A couple classical, one country, one jazz… it’ll practically be ‘Rock’ and ‘Miscellaneous’, then. Kids’ music, a decent showing.

 

    He’s still working when Jack puts Pete down-- he takes a break when Jack offers him a cup of coffee, and it feels like such an indulgence to think he could get used to this, to sitting on the couch again this time and discussing their days, discussing the things they haven’t had time to do, discussing life, before he goes back to the tapes and Jack bids him goodnight and goes to bed.

 

    Victor’s just settled down and drifted off, when Pete starts crying, and he’s off the couch immediately to pick him up.

 

    “Hey, hey… come on, honey, come on… We come on the sloop John B., my grandfather and me, ‘round Nassau town we did roam…”

 

    “Hey…” Jack’s voice, bleary, from the hall, and Victor switches to humming as he bounces Pete on his hip. “He probably needs his diaper changed, I can take him.”

 

    “No, I’ve got it, you go back to bed.”

 

    “... You sure?”

 

    “If I can perform surgery, I can change a diaper. Now… my only question is, do I scrub up for that?”

 

    Jack laughs. “Conventional wisdom dictates no. Though you’ll want to wash up after the fact. Changing table’s in his nursery, I’ll show you, his stuff’s all there. Victor-- you’re really--?”

 

    “I’m sure. Reporting for duty. I’ve got him.”

 

    “Okay. Through here-- you can see where it all is. If he’s not wet through he can wear the same jammies. Hey, buddy, you’re being good for Uncle Victor?”

 

    “Oh, he’s being good, he’s just uncomfortable, that’s all. Is that right, champ? You just need to feel clean? Hey, I feel you. I wouldn’t want to be in your shoes. Uh, diaper. Me, I like things neat and orderly and clean. We understand each other.”

 

    He gets Pete laid down on the changing pad, grabs everything he imagines he’ll need to change him.

 

    “You’ll want to drape something over him the second that diaper’s off, if you like things clean, he’ll start up again.”

 

    “What are you, my attending? I’ve got the diaper duty down, I’ll handle it. This is not my first time babysitting. I’ll get him back to bed, too.” Victor waves him off. “Go to sleep.”

 

    Although, he is glad to have that tip, lest he wind up urinated on. He hadn’t really thought about that. Still, it’s not rocket science. It’s not even brain surgery. It’s a diaper, he’ll manage. With or without supervision.

 

    “Okay. Goodnight, Victor. Night, Petey. Daddy loves you.” Jack comes into the room to bend over the table and kiss Pete’s forehead-- to pause a moment and clap a hand around Victor’s shoulder before he goes back to bed. Victor would return the gesture, but his hands are full…

 

    At least the wipes claim to kill ninety-eight percent of germs, which… well, can’t do much better than that.

 

    Pete starts up fussing the moment Victor starts to lower him down into his pen, even after he makes his way through singing the entirety of two songs to him, and so Victor settles down on the couch on his back, with Pete lying on his chest.

 

    “Okay, just until you fall asleep.” He whispers, rubbing Pete’s back. “Then you’re going to your own bed so Uncle Victor won’t worry about dropping you.”

 

    When Victor wakes, it’s morning, and Jack is lifting Pete off of him with a smile.

 

    “I promised you I could make eggs, right?” He greets.


End file.
